We have galley up and like it. The cook is part of the action in the saloon without having to stick up like a gopher to participate. Some galley down arrangements are pretty good and I even saw one that had the dinette convert to a stateroom... that would be useful! We like it on the same level, just like our house.

I like the arrangement of a deck-level pilothouse with the saloon/galley "knee deep" below the waterline. Provides great deck access and 180-degree uncluttered visibility from the helm. Party and non-navigational distractions are confined to the lower compartment. Here at dock, however, the party spreads into the pilothouse. More conducive to multiple conversations.

We only have a sink and fridge in the pilot house with just a small counter . Would like to have room for galley . I think galley up would be better . We are thinking about a outside galley against the back of pilot house .

That's certainly the case with the 34 Californian. With the galley down, you lose the Captain's stateroom port side amidship.

With the galley up, it seems like every surface serves double duty, at least it's that way on my boat. If I'm not cooking on the stovetop, it's covered and used as counter space, especially for drying dishes. Another counter surface transforms into my bait cutting board area when fishing. I like having those options available with this boat style.

Not long after acquiring our old GB36 we made the decision to "trade up" to a GB46. The Bellingham GB dealer had two at the time, one galley up and one galley down. We spent a fair amount of time on both of them evaluating the advantages and disadvantages, and we decided that for that size of boat, we much preferred the galley down.

In the GB46, the person in the down galley is not cut off from people in the main cabin. And the main cabin was far more usable with the galley not in it. And in this particular GB46, even though the galley was down there were still two nice staterooms in the forward cabin.

In the end we decided to spend the money on a different "toy," so we kept the old GB36. But if a boat is large enough to accommodate a down galley without giving up the desired accommodations in the forward cabin, we much prefer that.

The GB-type boat is not our favorite configuration for a slow-to-medium speed cruiser, however. We much prefer a pilothouse boat, particularly the deFever design used by American Marine in some of their Alaska line boats back in the 60s and 70s, the Flemming, and boats like the deFever 46. In these boats, the galley is typically placed immediately behind the raised pilothouse and so leaves a good-sized, unobstructed main cabin.

For cruising, we're strong galley up types as we love a very social environment where everyone can participate. As my wife says, no one should have to ride in the basement, especially the cook. We like keeping down just for sleeping and laundry and the mechanicals.

Now, it's not practical on some boats. We have a coupe we use mainly for short trips and the galley is down. We do very little food preparation on that boat while underway. Mainly sandwiches or veggie trays. When stopped, we normally grill up and do the other prep down then.

On a serious note I have no preference galley up or down. It doesn't even factor into my boat choice at all. Layout and safety trump location any day. None but the heartiest of souls will cook underway typically and then I wouldn't anticipate gourmet either.

Had an incident a year ago that put it into perspective for me. 80' European go fast yacht came down the channel at maximum wake speed, wreaked havoc up and down the channel. My son was at the helm and I was close by but not keeping watch. The last few seconds before impact my son sad dad with a worried tone every parent knows, looked up grabbed the wheel and throttle at the last second to turn into the washing machine. Buried the bow coming down the back of the first wave.

Alls well that ends well but my only thought was "thank goodness no one was cooking at the time". A pot of hot water could have changed the happy ending that day had.

__________________
Craig

It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they've been fooled - Mark Twain

The other part of the equation is..do you ever really cook when underway? And if you do..just how much time is actually spent in the galley?

Most don't..if looking at real passagmaking, then I see it a bit differently.

Exactly. The "cook is not part of the gathering" is for the most part. a red herring. So is the argument that gally down takes space from staterooms....gally up takes space from the salon....where most waking hours are spent...unless the boat has a nice sundeck, of course.